SYDNEY, N.S. — Local delivery companies are changing the way they conduct business as concerns over the spread of COVID-19 rise.
First Class Delivery Service owner Jimmy Donohue said his drivers are now only picking up grocery orders at stores that allow customers to pre-order online to reduce the amount of contact they have with the public. Unfortunately, he said, that doesn’t include all grocery stores.
“We’re pushing that service now. It’s not that we don’t want to go to Sobeys, it’s that there’s 10 people in every lineup with two shopping carts, so for a driver to get through there and then be around all those people, we’re just nervous and that’s why we’re staying away from a lot of the grocery stores at the moment. But people are still able to get their orders through the online stuff. We’re still picking stuff up at the corner stores and everything else it’s business as usual, it’s just until the mad dash and the panic stops at the grocery stores, that’s the only thing that we’re having a hard time with right now,” said Donohue, adding that in certain cases they will try to make exceptions.
“A lot of elderly don’t know how to go online and make that order. For the average customer, 80 per cent of the people say ‘Great, I’ll call you back with my order,’ then we can go pick it up, but we’re still going to come across some of our regulars or some other people who just can’t get out and we don’t want to leave them stuck. We’re doing the best we can and it’s tough.”
Food delivery company CB Eats began offering a no-contact option this week.
Owner Matt Stewart said customers using the online service can leave instructions on where they want their order left. They will then receive an automated text once the order is on the way and when it has been completed.
“We can leave it at the front door or on the step and likely knock on the door. But also the customer would receive automated messages through us at the various stages of the delivery process,” said Stewart, who is co-founder and CEO of Click2Order, the company that owns CB Eats and its affiliates in Antigonish, New Brunswick, P.E.I. and Alberta.
Stewart said their drivers have also been instructed on additional sanitizing efforts, including increased cleaning of surfaces within vehicles, increased use of hand sanitizer, and if in any case they are feeling a bit under the weather to stay home. He added that their existing policy requiring deliveries be pre-bagged at the restaurant is being strictly enforced.
Since restaurants have been ordered to close and can now offer only takeout orders, Stewart said many of the restaurants he partners with are struggling. As a result, CB Eats has reduced the standard pre-order fee it charges restaurants and they’ve reduced their delivery fees by 10 per cent.
“As a small business, and our restaurant partners are small businesses, it’s going to be tough on everybody,” said Stewart. “It would be opportunistic (to not lower) your prices because everyone is suffering right now, and if it goes longer than three weeks, it’s probably going to get a lot worse.
“A lot of them depend obviously on in-store traffic and obviously that’s not going to happen right now ... We thought it was in good faith and as a good partner to reduce that fee at this time so they get more on their margins at the end of the day.”
Donohue said it was difficult to find hand sanitizer and disinfectant wipes for his workers but he now has enough to last about three weeks.
He said many of his customers are “elderly shut-ins, people who can’t get out,” including one woman who was upset that she couldn’t place a Sobeys order.
“She was almost in tears,” he said. “My office manager actually went to get it herself because this lady’s got no other way to get her groceries — she’s 86 years old.”
Noting that his company handles the vast majority of pharmacy deliveries in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality, Donohue vowed First Class will continue to provide that service no matter what happens.
“I can tell you that a lot of business owners are afraid that we’re going to close. We’re not going to close as long as it’s safe out there for the drivers to keep going. Even if something ended up happening like it’s happened in some of those other countries where they shut down everything, we’ll still have a few drivers that are going to be able to get prescriptions and essentials out to people,” he said.
“Basically, if I have to go out and deliver them myself, I would. I’d make sure that people got their medicine.”
